Oh man, yea, I hated that course. Thought my weight and climbing was good when I tried it in the 4s, but could not match the surges up the climb at all and got popped on the 2nd lap.
Did Dana Point twice yesterday, played the role of packfill both times. It wasn't physically challenging, but the giant fields and narrow course made it tricky for me to move up. Never saw the front of the race at all, and just felt stuck in the washing machine sort of churning mid pack. Dodged a crash coming into 2 to go in the 30+ 3/4, and then got stuck behind people sitting up coming into the finish. Did the E2/3 as well, but an even bigger and more strung out field wasn't helping me. I think we had a full field of 100. Big pileup in the first 15 mins, followed by me losing my bottle, getting really thirsty, frustrated that I couldn't move up to do anything useful, so I pulled myself out with 5 to go. Lucky timing, that, because there was a crash on the next lap and then another coming into 1 to go.
NP was under 200W for both races.